I always thought this was the obvious direction for the series.
Instead of making Tales of the Walking Dead an anthology centered mostly on brand-new, one-off characters, why not use it to show us what some of our favorite survivors were doing before the zombie outbreak? The series was built around standalone stories anyway, so each episode could've focused on a different character.
I would've loved episodes about Rick's last days as a sheriff, Daryl and Merle before everything fell apart, Michonne with her family, Maggie growing up on Hershel's farm, Glenn before he met Rick, or even Carol before the apocalypse. These are characters we spent years with, yet most of their pre-apocalypse lives are left to our imagination.
Instead, most of the season focused on characters we'd never met before and would never see again, with Alpha being the only major exception.
To me, that's a much more interesting anthology. The Walking Dead already had a cast of fan favorites with years of unexplored backstory, and it feels like the show completely passed on the opportunity to tell those stories.